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Abyss
Abyss in Bloomington, MN
Current price: $15.99
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Size: CD
Anika
may be known for her aloof persona, but emotion has always been a vital part of her music -- and never more so than on
Abyss
. On
Change
and her albums with
Exploded View
, she warned listeners about issues like climate change and global politics, and her third album is the sound of someone well and truly fed up with everything. Working once again with
's
Martin Thulin
,
channels her frustration with a brutalist take on grunge (
Hole
Celebrity Skin
was one of her inspirations). She's no copyist, however, and
' primal minimalism has a rough elegance that only makes her messages more captivating. She snaps the album to attention immediately with "Hearsay," a needling caution against fake news and social media misinformation that's both ominous and wry; on "Oxygen," the echo engulfing her voice provides an ironic contrast to the suffocating lack of freedoms she details.
has always complemented her distinctive voice with equally ear-catching sonics, and even the album's heaviest moments -- the title track's hypnotic grind, "Out of the Shadows"' punky thrash -- are far from predictable. She brings just enough range to
to avoid monotony, letting the personal bleed into the political with "Honey"'s nightmarish hall of mirrors and tempering her anger with sorrow on songs such as "One Way Ticket," perhaps the most traditional protest song here. Her way with poetically simple songwriting also shines on "Into the Fire," which plays like a classic folk song viewed through a post-punk lens, and on the deceptively idyllic "Buttercups," which blurs the boundaries between a gesture of hope and an elegy. It's telling that the cheeriest-sounding song, "Walk Away," is about leaving everyone and everything behind (and it's worth listening to the album just for her impeccable delivery of the lyric "life can just suck"). Confrontational in ways quiet and loud,
is a testament to
's fierce artistic independence and gift for haunting moods. ~ Heather Phares
may be known for her aloof persona, but emotion has always been a vital part of her music -- and never more so than on
Abyss
. On
Change
and her albums with
Exploded View
, she warned listeners about issues like climate change and global politics, and her third album is the sound of someone well and truly fed up with everything. Working once again with
's
Martin Thulin
,
channels her frustration with a brutalist take on grunge (
Hole
Celebrity Skin
was one of her inspirations). She's no copyist, however, and
' primal minimalism has a rough elegance that only makes her messages more captivating. She snaps the album to attention immediately with "Hearsay," a needling caution against fake news and social media misinformation that's both ominous and wry; on "Oxygen," the echo engulfing her voice provides an ironic contrast to the suffocating lack of freedoms she details.
has always complemented her distinctive voice with equally ear-catching sonics, and even the album's heaviest moments -- the title track's hypnotic grind, "Out of the Shadows"' punky thrash -- are far from predictable. She brings just enough range to
to avoid monotony, letting the personal bleed into the political with "Honey"'s nightmarish hall of mirrors and tempering her anger with sorrow on songs such as "One Way Ticket," perhaps the most traditional protest song here. Her way with poetically simple songwriting also shines on "Into the Fire," which plays like a classic folk song viewed through a post-punk lens, and on the deceptively idyllic "Buttercups," which blurs the boundaries between a gesture of hope and an elegy. It's telling that the cheeriest-sounding song, "Walk Away," is about leaving everyone and everything behind (and it's worth listening to the album just for her impeccable delivery of the lyric "life can just suck"). Confrontational in ways quiet and loud,
is a testament to
's fierce artistic independence and gift for haunting moods. ~ Heather Phares
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